Rate My Professor Paige Toller

Dr. Paige Toller is a Professor in the School of Communication at the University of Nebraska Omaha, College of Communication, Fine Arts and Media. She serves as Graduate Teaching Assistant Coordinator for the Communication Studies Division. Toller earned her Ph.D. in Communication Studies, with a specialization in Interpersonal and Family Communication, from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 2006, and her M.A. from Abilene Christian University in 2000. She joined the University of Nebraska Omaha faculty shortly after completing her doctorate, advanced to Associate Professor, received tenure in spring 2012, and was later promoted to full Professor. Her teaching responsibilities include courses in interpersonal relationships, family communication, qualitative research methods, and health communication.

Toller's research focuses on grief communication, family identity and communication amid severe mental illness, end-of-life communication, and health communication. Her studies examine the communicative challenges families navigate during illness, loss, and bereavement. Select publications include “She’s not the child we had”: How parents reconstruct their child’s identity to include violence and mental illness (2023); Intergenerational conversations on death and dying during the COVID-19 pandemic: A pedagogical approach (2022); Begin with the End in Mind: A three-part workshop series to facilitate end-of-life discussions with members of the community (2018); Family Identity Disrupted by Mental Illness and Violence: An Application of Relational Dialectics Theory (2017); Communication and Bereavement (2015 chapter); Speaking Ill of the Dead: Anonymity and Communication About Suicide on MyDeathSpace.com (2012); Negotiation of Face between Bereaved Parents and Their Social Networks (2011); Bereaved Parents' Negotiation of Identity Following the Death of a Child (2008); and Bereaved Parents' Contradictions of Marital Interaction (2009). Toller received the UNO Alumni Outstanding Teaching Award in 2019. Her expertise supports media inquiries on mental health, family communication, and grief.